Early in the American Revolution, General George Washington saw a problem. As the Continental Army had problems getting supplies to its troops, the British Army saw a steady stream of unescorted supply ships crossing the Atlantic. The Americans needed a navy to intercept them. Officers couldn't spare any soldiers to form a naval force, and there was no time nor funds to build ships.  

However, in the lead up to the war, England had had responded to various tax protests by making it illegal for Americans to fish in the Atlantic! As soon as the war began, an estimated 4800 angry unemployed fishermen signed up to fight. Washington recognized the opportunity, and made them into an instant navy. The experienced seafarers needed no training, they just needed to be armed and paid. They even brought their own boats. Read how all this came about, and what American fishermen did to win the revolution at the Conversation. -via Smithsonian 

(Image credit: John F. Leavitt) 

British immigrant Laurence Brown has spent years comparing and contrasting Britain and the US in his series Lost in the Pond. Many times he's pointed out the many differences in British English and American English. But somewhere along the way, he discovered that there is also Canadian English, which is another thing altogether. This reminds me of when some French relatives visited Montreal and were shocked to find out that Quebecois is very different from French, but still understandable if you give it a few seconds. 

Americans and Canadians are used to each other's word usage and pronunciation, but seeing if from the perspective of one who used to be an outsider is illuminating. We've all heard about Americans traveling to Europe and telling people they are from Canada to avoid backlash, yet we've wondered how they got away with it. The differences in language are rather subtle, and often undetectable to anyone who speaks English as a second language, or even as a first language, as Brown does. 

By the way, I've never heard any American refer to a knit cap as a beanie, but I live near the South, where they are only worn a couple of months out of the year. This video has a skippable ad from 4:58 to 6:01. 

Humans since 1982 is a Swedish art studio that produces a series of works made of analog clocks that synchronize with each other to display the time digitally. This series is called A Million Times, and these masterpieces go for hundreds of thousands of dollars. 

Matt Zatorski and Patryk Zatorski created a version that you and I can afford- online. A Million Times Tribute is a grid of 288 analog clock faces that will display the time in digital numbers every minute, or whenever you reload it. But when it isn't displaying the time, it is a mesmerizing geometric artwork of rotating clocks. But that's not all! Run your mouse over the clocks and see them wake up and react in different ways. Click on them and make waves happen! Then find the star at the bottom right side of the page, and you can change the background, tempo, and choreography of the screen, and even bring up a version with 504 clocks. -via Everlasting Blort 

Alamo Drafthouse presents a new quiz show that challenges your ability to recognize or guess names. They give you a name, and you have to decide whether it's from the fictional kingdom of Eternia from the TV show He-Man and the Masters of the Universe,  or from the non-fictional kingdom of IKEA furniture. There is a certain demographic who should ace this quiz, since they grew up on He-Man and now buy IKEA furniture. For the rest of us, it's a toss up because each of these strange names can go either way. 

As the game progresses, you can start to see how these kingdoms are somewhat alike. IKEA gives its furniture names instead of simply stock numbers to enable customers to share their favorites, creating free publicity. He-Man named its characters so you can keep up with them in a TV show- but that TV show was born to promote a line of toy products. It might help you to know that some He-Man characters are named for their unique features, while IKEA doesn't do that- or if they do, it's in Swedish. -via Geeks Are Sexy 

No doubt you've seen pictures of this fairy tale tunnel through the forest. You may have wondered where it is, or even if it's real. It is very real. This forest sequence is in northwest Ukraine, near the town of Kevlan. It's called Tunel Kokhannia, or the Tunnel of Love. You might wonder who gets the job of maintaining such a beautiful passage, and the answer is... nobody. This is the result of not maintaining a railway. As the forest grew closer to the tracks, the train itself snips off any branches that extend too far or any plants that dare to grow too high on the tracks. Yes, a train passes by here three or four times a day, shaping the tunnel and its greenery. Just don't stick your hand out the train window! 

The Tunnel of Love doesn't look like this year-round, though. See what it looks like in pictures taken in autumn and winter, plus the story behind the tunnel and the folklore that's grown up around it at Kuriositas. 

(Image credit: iSavoch) 

People under 40 or so only know two things about Lady Diana Spencer, later known as Princess Diana. She was married to Prince Charles, the future King of England, until they were divorced. Then she died in a traffic accident in 1997 at the age of 36. Older people will remember the big news of the royal wedding in 1981 right after she turned 20. The way she was selected to be Charles' bride seemed a bit skeevy to Americans, but the young preschool assistant seemed happy. 

Yet underneath the royal trappings, Diana's life was no fairy tale. From the time she was born, her life was difficult, not financially, but psychologically. Still, she carried the weight of her family's expectations and then the world's expectations like a champ- until she couldn't. Then again, Diana's story contains elements of many stories we've heard before: the beautiful princess, absent parents, betrayal, a stiff upper lip, longing for love, and even a wicked stepmother. Maybe Princess Diana's life really was a fairy tale come true, just without the magic intervention and the "happily ever after" ending.  

The headline at Brilliant Maps is a real eye-opener: None of the countries that bordered Romania before World War II border it today. None? The map above shows the borders of the region before the war. Well, okay, the USSR and Yugoslavia no longer exist after the reshuffling of communist Europe in the 1980s and '90s. Hungary and Bulgaria are still there, but they are no longer kingdoms and just go by the individual names, so that's a bit of a cheat. Romania itself was named the Kingdom of Romania back then, too. Can we consider Czechoslovakia a cheat as well? No, because today, neither the Czech Republic (Czechia) nor Slovakia border Romania! The history of the region in the 20th century is enough to make Dracula's head spin.  

Okay, how about Poland? It's still a country, but no longer shares any border with Romania. The answer is a bit of land revealed in the modern map that you might be able to guess before you visit the post at Brilliant Maps. -via Nag on the Lake 

Eight years ago, John D. Boswell, known as Melodysheep (previously at Neatorama) brought us a timelapse of the entire universe, from the big bang to the present time. We posted it, but the video has been yanked because it has been completely reworked in Boswell's own style and words. The earlier film was a pastiche of video from various sources with celebrity narration. This is the same idea, with upgraded visuals, music, and narration by EpicSpaceMan (Toby Lockerbie). 

The story is ten minutes that represent 13 billion years of history. That means that every second covers 23 million years. Human beings don't show up at all until the last fraction of a second. But that doesn't mean there's no drama. A lot of things are happening while you try to wrap your head around the scope of time. This video has been adapted to play at various planetariums to be shown in their immersive theaters. If you've ever been to one of them, you can imagine how good this will look from the inside of a dome without the ads. -via Memo of the Air 

A movie star becoming president? That'll never happen! Well, I was just a kid in Kentucky at the time, and didn't even know Reagan was already the governor of California. But no one could have known that exactly 20 years later, the Berlin Wall would indeed fall. This is just one of many pop culture plots or jokes that accurately predicted the future way back in the past. 

No one remembers the sitcom Second Chance because it didn't last long, but they got the year of Gadhafi's death right- only three months off from his actual demise. Considering how many TV shows and movies make predictions about the future, often for comedic effect, it stands to reason that some of them would get it strangely right. But this list boasts 17 correct predictions, and 12 that were wildly off the mark. 

Sure, women in 1966 liked to get out of the house, but not necessarily to shop. A meaningful career that paid a decent wage would do nicely, thank you. Besides, we had been shopping through the Sears catalog for almost a hundred years already. You'll be able to distinguish the best and worst predictions, although some fall into the "anyone could have seen that coming" category. Read all 29 of them at Cracked. 

Every once in a while, you think about what people will say about you after you're gone. Will your life have a lasting impact on the world? And did you leave a good impression on the people you left behind? Mostly we picture that at our funeral, which could be the last time anyone talks about you at all. But if you happen to be the victim of a widely-publicized murder, you just might end up in a true crime story available to the entire world. And keep in mind that once you're gone, you cannot control the narrative in any way. 

Sure, that's a sad scenario. But in the hands of Ryan George it becomes a comedy as a murder victim's ghost gets a glimpse into the aftermath of that crime, and how his friends, neighbors, and casual acquaintances use their ten minutes of fame on a TV show about him.

Hollywood choreographer Busby Berkeley will always be remembered for his over-the-top production numbers that were filmed from overhead. Dozens of dancers assembled perfect geometric forms that resembled a moving kaleidoscope on the silver screen in the 1930s. You might be surprised to learn that Berkeley wasn't a dancer himself, and never even took one dance lesson in his life. His geometric sequences were born from the military. Berkeley spent World War I arranging military parades and spectacles, and took the idea of precision synchronization to Hollywood. 

The chorus girls who auditioned for Berkeley's movies were dancers, but it didn't matter whether they were any good. They were selected if the length of their legs matched his needs, and if they were willing to follow Berkeley's orders. That could mean holding a pose in a cold swimming pool for hours. And none could stand out. But it was a job during the Great Depression. Audiences loved the overhead shots, and Berkeley had all the work he wanted for a few glorious years. But he also had a dark side, from the night he drove away from a party drunk and killed two women to the movies he was fired from. Read about the rise and fall of Busby Berkeley at Utterly Interesting. 

Pumpkin was spoiled by her previous owner, an elderly lady who died. She's a megachonker who weighs 25 pounds. Now, I had an orange cat who weighed 20 pounds, but he didn't seem fat because he was a large fellow who stood as tall as my knees on four legs. But Pumpkin is an average sized house cat, so 25 pounds is twice what she should weigh. She's so wide they couldn't have given her any other name. 

As a special case, Pumpkin landed in a special home- with the president and CEO of Cincinnati's SPCA! Chris Seelbach is making getting Pumpkin back to a healthy weight his goal, but she's not quite on board yet. To make up for restricted food, Pumpkin is enjoying plenty of affection from the family. She doesn't like to walk much, but at :06 and 2:43 you'll see her walking toward the camera and you can almost hear the floor shaking under her. Oh Lawd, she comin'! See more videos of Pumpkin at TikTok. -via Laughing Squid 

The US goes all out for historical anniversaries, but the Sesquicentennial International Exposition in Philadelphia to celebrate 150 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence left a bad taste in many mouths. Called the Sesqui for short, the world's fair opened in May of 1926 while still under construction and closed on December 31st with a whimper instead of a bang. Early visitors were not impressed, and word of mouth kept crowds away the rest of the year. The project nearly bankrupted the city of Philadelphia. 

What went wrong? World's fairs usually take ten years of planning, but this time it was delayed by World War I. Federal money was allocated, but it was not nearly enough. Philadelphia itself was wracked by political corruption at the time, and taxpayers did not line up to support the venture. The original site proved to be inadequate, and the second site had problems that drove up costs and delayed construction. Philadelphia's political boss refused to delay the Sesqui because he needed the fair timed for an election. There were other factors that went into the failure of the Sesqui, too, which you can read about at Smithsonian. -via Strange Company 

(Image credit: John D. Cardinell/The Free Library of Philadelphia) 

You look at your income, your rent, and your grocery bill, and you think you should be able to make it work, despite the rising costs of rent, gas, and groceries. So why are you still broke? 

The modern world of internet apps makes everything simple and convenient, particularly spending money. When all you have to do is push one virtual button to buy something, the price doesn't hit you nearly as hard as handing over cash. That price may look small now, but when it's multiplied over time, you'd be shocked by the total. Automatic payments often go ignored, but the effect on your bank balance adds up, and suddenly you're broke and you don't even know how it happened. Chill Dude Explains goes over ten ways your money is disappearing while you don't even notice. Not all of them are due to the convenience of the internet, but all are easy to miss if you aren't paying close attention. 

(Image credit: WindyMover) 

Ingenuity can flourish anywhere, and folks in Missoula, Montana, know that if you want a cake that your party guests will be talking about for years, you go to the Walmart on Brooks Street. There are two cake decorators there who produce what has become known as "unhinged cakes." These are cakes or iced cookies with jokes and pop culture references that can be used for any occasion.  

(Image credit: stemmedflowers)

In the Missoula subreddit, the two decorators at this Walmart go by the names WindyMover and cakesbyzoey. They haven't been publicly identified or interviewed because of Walmart's policies. But locals buy their cakes out every day, and come back continuously to see what else they've dreamed up. Recent hits include Salad Fingers and musical lyrics paired with clever images. Where else would you find a cake inscribed with "I could tear up a Chinese buffet right now," or "I hope you like weird girl energy because that's all I got" ?

(Image credit: Freya_Firestar-27) 

Sure, they will take custom orders, but the random ideas these two decorators come up with are what make them so popular. Read about the unhinged cakes of Missoula at the Pulp. There are more cakes linked in the article, plus you can see pictures at the Missoula subreddit. -via Fark